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BackgroundThe aim of this study was to estimate the prevalence of tooth wear in the aging population of northwest China and to investigate the factors associated with such tooth wear.MethodsCross-sectional analytic clinical and questionnaire study was performed in 704 participants who had a mean age of 46.5 ± 0.2 SD and of which 367(52.13%) were males and 337(47.87%) female. These participants were invited when they attended the hospital which located in northwest China for routine oral examination.ResultsIn the maxilla of the examined patients, the rate of tooth wear varied from 85.51% for molar group, 89.77% for premolar group, 100.0% for canine group to 87.22% for incisor group. In the mandible, the rates were 86.36%, 88.92%, 100.0% and 91.19% for the four groups respectively. Moreover, both the incisor and canine groups of these patients showed median scores of 3, the premolar group showed a median score of 1, and the molar group had a median score of 2. Additionally, multiple factors were considered to contribute to these patterns of tooth wear, especially the habitual consumption of a hard or sour diet (P < 0.05,odds ratio 1.21, 95% confidence intervals 1.04-1.49).ConclusionsTooth wear is a common disease in which the anterior teeth exhibit greater wear than posterior teeth. The data support an association between tooth wear and dietary patterns.

Disorder-induced electron localization and metal-insulator transitions (MITs) have been a very active research field starting from the seminal paper by Anderson half a century ago. However, pure Anderson insulators are very difficult to identify due to ubiquitous electron-correlation effects. Recently, an MIT has been observed in electrical transport measurements on the crystalline state of phase-change GeSbTe compounds, which appears to be exclusively disorder driven. Subsequent density functional theory simulations have identified vacancy disorder to localize electrons at the Fermi level. Here, we report a direct atomic scale chemical identification experiment on the rocksalt structure obtained upon crystallization of amorphous Ge2Sb2Te5. Our results confirm the two-sublattice structure resolving the distribution of chemical species and demonstrate the existence of atomic disorder on the Ge/Sb/vacancy sublattice. Moreover, we identify a gradual vacancy ordering process upon further annealing. These findings not only provide a structural underpinning of the observed Anderson localization but also have implications for the development of novel multi-level data storage within the crystalline phases.

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Background/Aims: There are numerous treatment options following traumatic dental